INFLUENCE AND AUTONOMY IN PSYCHOANALYSIS $$$ ie Stephen A. Mitchell JAS THE ANALYTIC PRES 197 Hiledse, NJCHAPTER 4 INTERACTION IN THE Kieran TRADITION Jong with her extraordinary contributions to psychoanaly A wought, the work of Melanie Klein has provided the anal community with some of its most interesting ironies and ‘unexpected turns. Klein’s vision has traditionally been understood and pos “id psychology” par excellence. In the great schis lytic world between the Kleinians and the ego psychologists (devel- oped in the contributions of Anna Freud, Hartmann, and Mahler), Klein saw her work as extending Freud’s most radical explorations, as plumbing the instinctual depths ofthe psyches while the ego psychol- ogists veered off to explore (what the Kleinians co super oral, anal, dered) the more | surface adaptation of the ego to its surround. Klein traced cl oedipal instinctual currents to their earliest, most prim- itive roots. Alone among major theorists, Klein took seriously Freud's speculations about a death in net and portrayed the earliest days of the infant's life as rent by a profound struggle between biologically rooted, instinctually driven forces of life and death, Klein understood her own work, and it has been understood by many others, as an_ ~~ 102» CHAPTER 4 ever-decper exploration of the dark recesses of the instinctual core of the individual psyche Yet Klcin’s writings stimulated the extraordinarily rich, creative burst of theorizing that has become known as British object relations theories. Even though they broke off from the Kleinian group proper, the contributions of the major British Independents—Fairbairn, Balint, Winnicott, Guntrip, and Bowlby—all were in some sense rooted in, and impossible without, Klein’s ideas. And, ironically, per haps the central, most important feature of the post-Klein, British object relations theorizing is the importance it places on the environ- on the eritical significance of the interactions between the and caretakers and of the interactions (apart from the delivery of interpretations) between the analysand and analyst. "This surpr ig reversal came about because of what Klein found as she plumbed the depths of the id. Instead of impulses, the diree- tionless packets of tension Freud had depicted in his “id,” Klein began to describe protorelationships between impulses and their built-in objects, passionate love and hate experienced in relation to ‘good and bad objects and part-objects. Greenberg and (1983) traced the ways in which Klein’s theorizing about the instincts provided a conceptual bridge to later object relations theorists, The relationships Klein depicted were all in the mind of the ¢ independent of real experience with others. Fairbairn, Winnieot, and other later theorists took Klein’s concepts—internal objects, internal object relations, paranoial and depressive positions—but filled in the objects with real interactions with real careg |, prior to and largely We find a similar ironic and unexpected turn when we consider the impact of Klein’s work on subsequent theorizing about the nature of the analytic process. Klein herself was very traditional in this regard. She regarded the analytic situation in purely one-pe terms. The patient provides free-associations (with childn associations are offered in the form of play); the analyst listens for aand interprets the conflictual psychodynamic struggles underlying the patient's conscious experience. The analyst is present purely as interpreter As with theory, Klein's contributions to technique ean be (and often have been) regarded as extensions of the original “id psychol-of oor? creti¥ yon gen tHe Iuteraction in the Kleinian Tradition » 103 ogy’*of Freud. The ego psychologists picked up on a different thread jn Freud’s opus, following his suggestion (e.g., Freud, 1910) that interpretations should be directed only at resistances and material that had already emerged in the preconscious. The analyst must address the surface, they felt, and work her way slowly down. The id can be reached only by way of the ego, and the ego positions itself to ward off the analysts interventions, In contrast, Klein favored immediate, deep interpretations of instinctual conflict and psychotic anxieties. With the proper tools, the analyst can penetrate to the patient's deepest anxieties, Klein felt, and those deep interpretations are reassuring, because the patient feels deeply understood, Kleinian analysts took on the reputation for speaking, directly to the unconscious.” In some respects, Klein’s technical approach was the most radical extension of a one-person perspective: the sole focus is on the deepest recesses of the patient's instinctual conflicts, which the analyst interprets from a neutral perch, Tike a well-concealed photographic blind in the heart ofthe jungle. et, once again, what Klein “found” in the unconscious opened up a tadically different path from the direction she herself was pursu ing and felt comfortable with. For what Klein discovered in tracing the unconscious phantasies! of her patients was a mechanism she called “projective identification,” in which the patient imagines he hhas placed part of his own mental content into the mind of another, originally the mother, currently the analyst. The patient, in the deep- est recesses of his unconscious, imagines a profound form of interac- tion between himself and others. It is erucial to remember that for Klein the interaction never actually takes place; itis fantasized. Projective identification is a defense mechanism like any other defense mechanisms it takes place in the mind of the patient, and the analyst discerns its presence by discovering its workings within the patient’s associations. Te wasa short step, however, from projective identification as a fan- tasy of interaction to projective identification as an actual form of The focus was still on uncovering the deepest contents of interaction TW Thave retained the Kleinian spelling phantasy with reference tothe dis tinctively Klcinian notion of unconscious , primitive thoughts and images,104 « cuapren 4 the patient's mind, but, with the interpersonalization ofthe concept of projective identification, the contents of the patient's mind were now often to be found in the analysts experienee. This development was accomplished in the work of Klein’s analytic descendants, and it has developed, in the past few decades, into one of the most powerfial and fascinating tools forthe study of interaction in the analytic situation, Klein herself it should be noted, remained loyal to a purely one- person perspective, even as het followers bi in interaction, in the to become interested analysts experience as providing clues to the patients struggles. ‘Thus, Paula Heimann’s (1949) ground-breaking exploration of the usefil dimensions of eountertiansference played a major role in the split between Klein and Heimann (see Grosskurth, 1986), and Klein always remained dubious of Bion’s extension of he concept of projective identification to an exploration of the analysts ‘emotional states. Despite her own reservations, however, Klein's eon tributions have played a central role in the recent exploration of the interactive nature of the analytic process ‘The Classical Kleinian Period An understanling of transference isthe centerpiece of any conceptual model of analytic process. The analyst listens to what the pati saying and fincls something problematic. ‘The patient is br something to the immediate analytic situation from somewhere Something is being transferred. What is it? Where cloes it conn from? Different answers to these questions create the important variations among current approaches to the way the psychoanalytic process works, its therapeutic action. ‘Transference for Freud is a temporal displacement. As Freud lis tened to his patient's verbalizations, he heard conflicts between instinctual impulses and defenses, and the instinctual impulses he dis- cemed were the sexual and aggressive wishes of infantile life. The ie is disjointed in time. He experiences the analyst as he experienced his oedipal objects of long ago; he wishes for grat fications from the analyst that a carly childhood. ent’s exper propriate only in the coutext ofInteraction in the Kleinian Tradition » 105 Klein’s concept of the analytic process remained traditional in fun- damental respects. She viewed the analytic situation as a neutral medium within which the mind of the patient revealed itself through associations. She positioned the analyst outside the flow of the jent’s dynamics, as an objective interpreter of them. The analyst aakes no contribution to the content ofthe sessions: her own dynam- ies, the idiosyncrasies of her own personality, her manner and actions, these are all rendered invisible or standard in good analytic technique. For both Freud and Klein, what the analyst does isto interpret, and the material that the analyst interprets is wholly independent of the analyst herself, ‘Yet important innovations in Klein’s understanding of the analytic process evolved slowly, and the changes in that understanding were often masked becanse of her identification of herself as simply an extender of Freud’s vision, Her mission, as she saw it in the 1920s, was to find direct evidence in the play of children for the theories about early childhood that Freud had developed in his reconstructive analytic work with adults. However, by the early 1950, Klein realized that, with her emphasis on unconscious phantasy, internal objects, and infantile anxieties, she had arrived ata view of the analytic situa- tion that was new in certain major respects. Klein considered analytic work with children to be identical in its cssential nature to analytic work with adults. The patient associatively reveals the contents of her mind, within which are contained uncon- scious impulses and fantasies, which the analyst interprets. The only difference is that, whereas with adults thoughts are revealed verbally through free associations, with children thoughts are revealed though play. When we examine Klein’s understanding of the way the analyst functions in the traditional role of interpreter, however, we find important differences between Freud and Klein. These concern the content of interpretations, the timing of interpretations, and the locus of interpretations. Klein’s departure from Freud in all these areas lerives from her very different way of understanding the nature of transference ‘Transference for Klein was not primarily a temporal displacement, but a displacement from internal to external. As Klein listened to her patients’ verbalizations, she heard not conflicts between discretea _| 106» CHAPTER 4 impulses and defenses against those impulses, among larger sectors ofthe pati aggressive impulses, but more around overwhelming and ov conflictual battles Klein diel not hear errant sexual or complex versions of the self organized ferpowering commitments to love and hate. Klein envisioned an elaborate internal object world, with difen- ent segments ofthe self passionately engaged with dramatically die. ent types of objects, where issues of violence and destruction, love and redemption are continually at play. The stakes are always high; the anxiety often unbearably intense ‘Thus, the content of Klein’s interpretations became different from the content of Freud’s interpretations, Klein's interpretations became more complex. They did not depict discrete impulses attached to ancient forbidden objectss ships betw they depicted ongoing, current relation- segments of the self engaged with current phantasied internal presences, displaced into the media ship. As Klein (1952) pat it, “| instinctual aim, while I mean of the analytic elation- Freud] is referring to the object of an addition to this, an object-relation involving the infant’s emotions, phantasies, anxieties, and defences” (p-51). For Freud, the patient’s past is alive in the oedipal objects of their desire; they play out early loves, fears and traumas over and over ‘gain, in what Freud called the repetition compulsion. For Klein, the patient's past is alive because it has been presences that are in active, loving each other. For Fr “This is wl internalized into dynamic 5 and murderous relationships with |, the content of interpretations takes the fo you desived and experienced then and are displacing it onto now.” For Klein, the content of interpretations takes the forms “This is what you intensely desire and dread now: “The timing of interpretations also changed! dramatically, Fr was dealing with what he regarded as Infantile conflicts underlie the surface tnind, and their derivatives are discernible in the paticnt’s free associ, ations Like a paleontologist slowly uncovering fossils from underly. ing geological strata, the analyst has all the time in the world. The infantile conflicts, ike the fossils, are not going any place, Klein was dealing with what she came to regard as much more dynamic situations, and the prototype becamne the e id ntially static situations, structures of the patient's at imaginativeInteraction iu the Kleinian Tradition « 107 play. The child uses the toys ofthe consulting room to create complex veenarios,and the action often moves ata frantic pace. Murders, dis- memberments, magical restorations are packed together in a dense ‘nix, and a continual commentary is necessary to keep track of the tition, Ifthe child is to become more in touch with the kaleidoscopic flow of phantasy, Klein became convineed, one or two carefully worded, suc ctations per session will not do. Klein ext children into a very different undler- standing of the pacing of interpretations with adults as well. Free asso- ciations, she came to believe, contain complex unconscious phantasies in which the patient moves around and continually reposi- tions different segments of self and different sorts of objects: now they are inside the self now they are in the outside world; now they are at wars now they are at peace. The material to be uncovered interpre~ tively is not static and buried, but fluid and accessible. As De Bianchedi ct al. (1984) have noted, there isa “dramatic point of view” inherent in Kleinian metapsychology: “The ego aud its objects inter- actin a personified way, they assume roles, are endowed with inten~ tions, experience sensations and personal feelings, and carry out meaningful actions (the plot). This drama takes place in different set tings and always unfolds within an emotional context” (p. 395). "The goal of Klcinian interpretation is not a reconstruction of the distant past, buta running commentary on current dynamic phantasy. The analyst for Klein became less like a paleontologist and more like a war correspondent. What is crucial is an up-to-date account from the front. ‘Along with changes in the content and titning of interpretations, there evolved in Klein’s clinical method a shift in the locus of inter~ ons as well. Freudians had always combined interpretations of ence (those which Strachey, 1994, for example, considered with other kinds of necessary interpretations, ofboth the past and of the patient’s current life outside the analytic relationship. ‘The Kleinians became more exclusively focused on the analytic rel tionship itself‘This was a natural extension of Klein’s evolving rele nition of transference and the analytic situation, Klein regarded the patient in the analytic situation as concerned essentially with maintaining his psychic equilibrium and managing108 = CHAPTER 4 the clashing sectors of his experience evoked by the analysis. As the «goal of interpretation shifted from reconstruction to running com- mentary, the locus of interpretation shifted from past to present, and from outside to inside the analytic relationship. Speaking about the past can be used to avoid dealing with powerful feelings concerning the analyst in the present, “The patient may at times try to escape from the present into the past rather than realize that his emotions, anxieties, and phantasies are atthe time operative in fall strength and focused on the analyst” (Klein, 1952, p. 56n), For Freud, the present is a vehicle for understanding the past, and itis by understanding the past thatthe patient is set fre from infantile fixations. Klein’s manner of understanding the relationship between past and present slowly reversed Freud’s, For Klein, the past became a vehicle for understanding the present, and itis by understanding the present that the patient is set free from pathological patterns of man- aging anxiety. ¥or the patient is bound to deal with confit and anxieties v-exper- enced towards the analyst by the same methocls he used inthe pas. “That is to say, he turns away from the analyst as he attempted to turn aoray from his primal objects; he tries to split the relations thin keeping him either asa good or asa bad figure: he defleets some of the feelings and attitudes experienced towards the analyst on to other peo ple in his current life (Klein, 1952, pp. 55-56] It is very important to keep in mind that despite the dramatic shifts in Klein’s vision of the analytic process in the direction of interaction, the analytic relationship and the here-and-now, Klein always regarded the material that was interpreted as located exclusively inside the patient’s mind. The phantasmagorie ways in which the patient expe- riences the analyst are direct products ofthe patient’s phantasies and have nothing at all to do with anything the analyst has actually done or experienced. There isa corollary to Klein’ traditional intrapsychic focus that is crucial to understanding her theory of the analytic process. The patient is able to differentiate the analyst in his interpretive capacity from phantasied images of the analyst in the transference. Thus, thereSOO Oooocrvwll OO Interaction in the Kleinian Tradition = 109 is an implicit assumption, as I noted in Chapter 2, of a channel through which the patient can hear the running commentary of the analysts interpretations that circumvents the transference and makes them analytically usable to the patient. ‘The assumption of a clear separability hetween real objects and phantasied objects runs throughout Klein’s thought and constitutes a central, se-contradicting confusion in her model. On one hand, Klein believed that there is a continual interaction between real objects and phantasied objects. The child’s world is dominated by powerful phantasied objects derived from instinctual sources; she projects these onto the outside world and then reintro- Jjeets them to form hi eyele, reproject internal objects, which are, in a perpetual d onto external objects. Real objects are the reposi- tory of the child’s projections, and the indestructibility of real objects are vital to the child’s gradual development of reality testing and Deliefin his reparative capacities. (See Greenberg and Mitchell, 1983, Chapter 5, for a faller discussion of Klein’s derivation of early object relations.) On the other hand, Klein (1932) assumed that real objects are somehow distinguishable and protected from the child’s projections all along; (Phe small child’s superego and object are not identical; but it is eon: Linually endeavoring to make them interchangeable, partly 30 as to lessen its fear ofits super-ego, partly 90 as to he better able to comply with the requirements ofits real objects, which do not coincide with the unrealistic commands ofits introjected objects... the ego of the simall child is burdened with this difference between the standards of | its super-ego and the standards ofits real abjects, with the result that it is constantly wavering between its introjected objects and its real ‘ones—between its world of phantasy and its world of realty (pp. 249-250} Consider the claim Klein is making here: the real pare al objects are internalized through a chi separate from the phantasy-domi- nated cycles of projection and introjection. This is an odd claim. It suggests that despite internal presences with attacking, persecutory———~y 110 «CHAPTER 4 attitudes, the child sees the parents realistically as having different, more benign attitudes. She seems to assign to the small child a capac- ity to apprehend reality directly in a fa in adults, The assumption of two distinct although intermingling channels between the mind of the individual andl the outside world has been retained throughout Kleinian thinking and is one of its cen- tral andl most determinative features, ‘Thus, Hanna Segal (1992) has argued that the mind of the infant is wived with Chomnsky-like aniver- sal grammatical images to generate both “perceptions” and delusional phantasies of early objects. These are never found in pure form and (as in Freud's notion of instinctual “fusion”) inevitably intermingle, but they are generated separately and independently of each other! ‘This understanding of the relationship between perception and fantasy, objectivity and subjectivity, contrasts with the move widely held notion that more objective, consensually valid organizations of experience are formed gradually, through interaction with others Perhaps this odd attribution of the capacity to discern an objective reality to the mind of the small child was important to Klein because a similar, parallel claim was essential to her model of the analytic process. As I noted in Chapter 2, Klein believed that the analyst's interpretations are generally experienced by the patient not in the context of the transference, but as tuterpretations, that they have access directly to imconscious recesses of the patient’s mind. Phe hion difficult to imagine even analyst be experienced in the transference as a killer or seducer, Jput at the point at which the interpretation is made, the patient is able to grasp the analyst’s offering as neither an attack or a sexual over ture, Thus, the assumption is maintained throughout that at the moment an interpretation is delivered, the patient ean distinguish the analytic object from other, familiar objects within his world. We shall see thata challenge to this assumption has been an important feature in the development of contemporary, neo-Kleinian thinking, 2. *Preconceptions or primitive phantasies ave tested in perception, just as hypotheses ate tested against re ‘external ality takes place th ‘omnipotently distorts the object and interferes with reality testing, Reality test This matching of ner phantasies against out life but is interfered with if te phantasy ing the fails andthe wisl-falfilling phantasy is preferred to and dominates real (Segal, 1994, p.79) ity; but the dominance is always only pattiInteraction in the Kleinian Tradition «111 Contemporary Kleinians: Projective Identification and Countertransference Elizabeth Bott Spillius has, among her other contributions, provided an invaluable service asa historian ofthe Kleinian tradition, Heer com- mentaries and recent papers by other authors have begun to modify the unfortunate way in which Klein’s work has been perceived in the United States. Mainstream American psychoanalysis has, until recently, been dominated by Freudian ego psychology, which was antagonistically pitted against the Klcinians in the internecine wars within the British Psycho-analytical Society dating back to the 1930s (sce King and Steiner, 1991, Grosskurth, 1986). While Klein’s contri- butions were widely appreciated throughout Europe and South America, her work was denigrated as either preposterous or sinister in the United States (see, for example, Greenson, 1974). There was a kind of splitting in the importing of British object relations theories, encailing an often striking idealization of Winnicott as a counterpart to avillainization of Klein. Spillius (1988) adds a broader perspective on the negative reac- tion to Kleinian thinking by arguing that the Kleinian literature of the 1950s and 1960s represented a falling away from the freshness of Klcin’s original vision, In Spillius’s view, Klein’s original clinical approach contained a balance and originality that was lost when applied by her followers. Klein framed interpretations in terms of body parts and processes because this language was close to the expe- rience of the disturbed children with whom she was working. In the hands of subsequent authors, “part-object” language became jar- gonized and formulaic. Klein’s clinical emphasis on aggression was always balanced, Spillius argues, by an equally strong emphasis on love and reparation. In the hands of subsequent authors, however, aggression became an almost exclusive focus. ‘Therefore, the Kleinian theory and technique broadly rejected by the American psychoanalytic community in the 1950s and 1960s, ‘was, in Spillius’s view, an essentially debased version of the Kleinian approach. A new and revitalized application of Klein’s contributions hhas emerged in the past two decades. Although analytic authors vir~ tually never acknowledge the validity of any critics or detractors,112s cuarrer 4 contemporary or neo-Kleinian contributions seem to have v incorporated and responded to the criticisms ofthe Klein of the 1950s and 1960s, ‘The key imiovation marking the transition from the classical Kleinian period to the contemporary Kleinian approach was the change in the way Klein's concept of projective identification was understood and used (see Sandler, 1987;’Tansey and Burke, 1989), For lein, as noted, projective identification is, like all defense mecha nisms,a phantasy in the patient's mind. ‘Phe patient imagines placing a sector of himself into another person and remains identified with (and often attempts to control) that other person, who now contains part ofhim. How does the analyst know that the patient unconscious phantasy? ‘Phe same way that the analy is able to interpret other unconscious phantasies: by following the patients free associations and discerning their latent meanings, Iewas Bion who began to think of projective identification not just such an st discovers and as a phantasy, but also as an event, not just as a process taking place in the mind of one person, but also as a form of interaction takiug place between two people. Bion interpersonalized projective identification. The target of projective identification, Bion suggested, feels some thing. The mental content that the patient is evacuating, nudging, pushing, insinuating into the mind of the analyst registers in some fashion in the experience of he analyst. Bion broadened the concept of projective icentification into a vital developmental interaction and form of communication between the baby and mother. ‘The baby pro- jects the dense, intolerable, eh nated by psychotic anxietie tic jumble of early experience, domi- into the mother, who, if she is appropriately receptive, receives, contains, fashion, and thi and reorganizes that men: content is subsequently tal content in a soothin veintrojected by the baby? ‘The analytic situation and the positions ofits two participants vis- -vis each other can be,and has been, thought about in many different 3, Bion's account of projective identification as x form of interaction between mother and baby bears a strong resemblance to Loewald’s (1960) aceannt of the interaction between the primary-pracess mentation of the baby and the seeoudlary-process resources af the mothersical the Ky 1989) ned a Interaction in the Kleinian Tradition = 113 ways. Like most complex phenomena, we often try to grasp its nature through metaphors drawn from other areas of experience. Freud’s favorite, recurrent metaphors for portraying the analytic situation ‘were military; he invoked images of troop deployments, hunting wild animals, chess (a mock battle) strategies. The predominant metaphor through post-Freuclian analytic theorizing, in its shift from oedipal to preoedipal dynamics, has been the baby at the breast. How that rela- tionship is viewed varies greatly. While Winnicott evoked a playful, spontaneous, omnipotent baby, Klein portrayed a baby rent by some= times unbearably intense greed and envy, gratitude and hatred. Bion (1962, 1963) added a new metaphor, the mind of the mother a8 con- tainer, and that addition has opened up an extremely rich avenue for subsequent Kleinian contributions. “The baby, unable to bear and process the intensely anxious, dense jumble of his own primitive thoughts and impulses, projects them into the mother; she contains and organizes them, and the baby reinternal- ines them in a now tolerable and usable form. This developmental ‘event became the paradigm for understanding the analytic situation in contemporary Kleinian thought. The analytic situation is no longer viewed as involving the displaying of the mind of the patient and the observing and decoding ofits contents by an external observer. The analytic situation is now understood as involving the stormy and extremely intense colonizing of the mind of the analyst by the patient. The most important data for analysis are no longer found outside che analyst in the patient’s associations; the most important data for anly- sis are now discovered within the analyst's own experience itself Th Kleinian understanding of the analytic situation became profoundly interactive. The analyst purges his mind of all mental content, all nemory and desire” and many of the experiences that show up dur- ing the session are understood as deposited there through the patient's projections. Bion (1967) wrote, “The psychoanalyst should aim at achieving a state of mind so that at every session he feels he has not seen the patient before. Ihe feels he has, he is treating the wrong, patient” (pp.18-19). How do the contents of the patient’s mind get into the analyst’s experience? This question of transmission is approached quite differ ently by different authors. Some authors seem to imply a kind ofHye cuarren 4 telepathic process. The patient hi a phantasy that his own murder- ‘ousness, oF panic, or dread is located inside thea Iyst begins to find himself experiencing precisely th lyst, and the anae tat murdlerousness, panic or dread. Other authors (Grinberg, 1962; Racker, 1968, otsti, 1981; Ogclen, 19825 ‘Tansey and Burke, 1989) suggest that the patients fantasy about what is inside the analyst leads the patient to treat the analyst accordingly, and the analyst picks up and uncon. sciously identifies with the way in which the patient is treating him, Joseph (1989), who, after Bion, has mace the most important con tributions to contemporary Kleinian approuches to projective alent cation, speaks of the pressure brought to beat on t patient's projections. The pati analyst by the ’s words, demeanor, and silences all have an impact on the analyst’s experience, creating states of mind in the analyst that correspond to the patient’s proje argues, patients are in ious. Thus, Joseph olved in “living out experiences in the transfer- ence rather than thinking anc! talking about them” (p. 7), And that liv. ing out nudges the analyst into dyn states of mind, The analyst, in turn, ¢ mically relevant experiences and loes not simply deliver interpre- {ations from a neutral, detached platform outside the analytic fil, portrayed by Kl within the co n. Analysts often find themselves operating from ransference, from within the context of the state of tmind induced in them by the patient’s projections. Thus, in the inno- vations in Kleinian thought developed by Bion and Joseph, the an Iytically essential material to be understood is no longer fo the mind ofthe patient, but is discovered in the mind of th wrell and in the complex interactions between the two participants, Spills (1988) suggests that, although there are differences in emp sis, this new focus on projective identification andl counter ence has become “part of the standard approach of every Kl analyst” (p. 10). More than any other group of analysts, the Kleinians worked with chilevea and psychoties. Merton Gill (1989, p. 213) once quipped that aan analyzable patient is one with whom the analyst can maintain the illusion of neutrality. Whereas well-behaved neuro make it possible o preserve ase c patients offen nse of oneself as neutral and always control, children and psychotics tend to he less well behaved and, ‘consequently, tend to get uncer the analyst's skin, Bion’s realizationa Interaction iu the Kleinian Tradition = 115 that the patients he was working with had gotten under his skin led to the development of the concept of projective identification as an effort to explain how that came about. Gradually, subsequent Kleinian authors realized that the impact of ess disturbed patients on the ana- Iyst’s experience is no less important in psychoanalytic work with them but merely more subtle and easy to miss. Related to the question of transmission noted earlier (the mecha- nism through which the patient’s projections show up insicle the ana- Iyst’s experience) is the question of the nature of the receptor site in the analyst that receives the patient's projections. Here, too, there is an interesting range of approaches. Bion established a dramatic icleal that has had a powerful impact, ‘on the ways in which Kleinians tend to approach this problem, Bion (1967) argued that, in order for the analyst to receive and clearly apprehend the patient's projections, he has to rid himself of his own ‘mental content, to transform himself into a clean and featureless con- tainer, The analyst should proceed with “neither memory nor desire,” Bion suggested; the analyst encounters the patient afresh each time, remembering nothing about her, wanting nothing from her. Memories and desires can only interfere with a full experience of where the of patient is today and what the patient needs the analyst for and feels about them, At the other end of the continuum, Racker (1968) portrays the analyst as able to receive and experience the patient’s projections only through his own powerful identifications with them, The primitive cs of mind the patient experiences as residing in the analyst corre spond to very similar, primitive states of mind that constitute the ana- Iyst’s internal world. All of us, Racker argues, experienced intense, enveloping anxieties as children, and those anxieties, primitive impulses, early configurations of self in relation to powerful and often 7 Recke s-Klcnian, Although he cnpioye Kc’ langoge atl bse concep he econtentuaiac them int i most accurately described as 4 n framework in which aggression is derivative and reactive, wot instinctual, and i whieh the healing power of the analysts love (reminiscent of Ferenczi) is cmphasized. Many features of Racker"s approach to analytic interaction antici pated subsequent contemporary developments in many respects he was radi cally ahead of his time and perhaps ours as well16 = cuawren 4 frightening objects~ that whole pulsating mass of childhood longings and terrors—are alive in each of us and regularly evoked in the analyst by the patient’s projections. Thus, for Racker, the patient’s projec: tions are not received by the analyst’s suspending his own memories and desires; the patient’s projections are received by discovering which ofone’s own memories and desires have been stirred up. “This central question concerns the place of the analyst's own dynanties, his own idiosyneratie subjectivity in the interactions that ‘constitute the analytie process. Bion’s approach ean be viewed as an extension of the classically Freudian concept of neutrality, For Frew. the analyst is a blank screen onto which the patient projects his trans ference. For Bion, the screen became a container; the projections are found not on the surface of the analyst but inside his own experience. ‘There is an implicit anal ideal iw this way of thinking about analytic interaction. ‘The container, like the screen, needs to be blank. The analyst's own idiosyncratic subjectivity, the analyst's own dynamics and issues, are contaminauts. Racker's (1968) approach, in sharp contrast, places the analyst as her own person at the center of analytic interaction. The analyst ean experience the patient's projections only through icleutifications made possible by similar experiences of her own, If we follow along this Tine, the next important question concerns the nature of those early, intensely conflictual experiences of the analyst’ that make possible the reception of the patient's projections. Racker suggested that as infants we versal experiences leading to common internalized object relations. We all began life as helpless beings, ofien overcome with intense needs, in the hands and at the merey of powerful maternal object. ‘Therefore, we all suffered, and episoclicaly still suffer, from intense paranoidl and depressive anxiety, longing for the other who can relieve us of our profound need and fearing that she has purposely aban- dloned us to our suffering, From Racker’s point of view, we have ll felt this feelings we al fel it. Iisa kind of generic experience. Therefore, ‘when & patient projects such neediness into the analyst (claiming for himselfan illusory self-sufficiency), the experiene that arises in any competent analyst ought to be roughly the same, because it is a generic, infantile state of mind that is evoked. It should not matter I have certain kinds of uni0 Interaction in the Kleinian Tradition «117 whether the patient is in treatment with analyst A oranalyst B or C. ‘The experience evoked in each analyst shoul be essentially the same, and the very same, correct interpretation of the patient’s projections should emerge.’ ‘Thus, even in Racker’s formulations, the idiosyncratic features of the analyst's personal history and character are ultimately factored out of analytic interactions, This makes it possible for us to retain the belief that, although central to the process itself, the personal, idio- syncratic features of the analyst have no ultimate impact or influence on the product of the analysis, which is solely det ned by whatis brought by the patient and is merely evoked, facilitated, and actual. ined by a competent analyst. Although the role ofthe analyst inthis line of contibutions to understanding analytic interaction is very such a hands-on participation (metaphorically speaking), the analyst | | | still leaves no fingerprints, Interaction in the analytic relationship h: the Kleinian tradition largely thro been explored within h the concept of projective id fication. It should be noted that within this concept, the roles are very asymmetrical and well defined, ‘The patient does the projecting: the analyst does the receiving and containing, This kind of role specificity with regard to projective identification has important implications for the ways in which influence and the problem of autonomy have been approached in this tradition, No matter how deeply implicated the analysts in the process at any point, in a general sense, the patient is always understood to have “started it” (Hoffman). The patient's pro- jections set the agencla, uo matter how deeply and personally the ana- Other authors have approached the analyst's receptor sites for the patient's projections ia ways similar to Racker. Grinberg (1962) wrote about “proj ul Money-Kyrle (1955)suggests that the analyst’ understanding ofthe patient is based on an unconscious identification his (he analyst's) chill self Pick (1985) argues tha the patient does not projet into the analyst tty, but projects into spe sifie parts ofthe analyst, which is where the analyst ree with the patent throw res the projection; “for lys’s wish to bea mother, the wish ‘0 be all-knowing orto deny unpleasant knowledge, into the analyst's instinctual saclism, or into his defences lyst example, . the patient projects into th sit. Al above all, he projects into the ana tor into the analysts internal objects” [p. 41}18 + cuaprER 4 lyst is drawn into the dynamic turbulence. Thus, the particular ana. lyst exerts no influence on the process and the patient's autonomy is, protected. Not considered is the extent to which the analyst might be under stood to involve himself in projective identifications of his own, Are there dynamics that begin with the analyst and into which the patient is drawn? Do particular analysts draw out different dynamics in their patients? Might one consicler the practice of psychoanalysis in general an extension of projected features of Freud’s psychodynamics, and the particularities of the ways it varies from clinician to clinician an elaboration of their own histories and internal worlds? ‘Phis theme is explored further in the next chapter Interaetive Themes in Current Kleinian Contributions As we noted at the beginning of this chapter it has always been diff cau to assign a place to Kleinian theory with respect tothe traditional categories dividing psychoanalytic schools: drive theory versus object relations. Klcin always identified herself as a loyal devotee of instinct theory. Yet Freud's instinct theory relegated objects to a secondary status. The source, the aim, the impetus were all intrinsic features of the drives the object was found “accidentally” and was valuable only because it was usefil in achieving the aim of the drive, tension redue on. Klein, on the other hand, regarded the object of the drive as an cessential,a priori feature of the drive itself; oral libido does not catheet the breast as it does in Freud’s theory, because the baby happens to discover through feeding that the breast isa source of pleasure. Oral libido, for Klein, is directed, inherently and fundamentally, toward the breast. Thus, despite the similavity in terms, political loyalties have asked the extent to which Klein’s chive theory ras always a different kind of drive theory from Freuut’s drive theory; for Klein, the drive is inherently directed toward and perpetually seeking its natural objects. This relational dimension of Kleinian theorizing has been further developed by more contemporary Kleinian authors. Rather than locating mind in the individual, as Freud did, an individual that isInteraction in the Kleinian Tradition » 119 forced through necessity (frustration) to turn toward and deal with external reality, contemporary Kleinian authors now tend to view mind as located within afield comprised of more than one individual. Thus, Pick (1985) argues that insofar as we take in the experience of the patient, we eamnot do so without also having an experience. If there is a mouth that seeks breast as an inborn potential, there is, I believe, psychological equiv alent, ¢.,8 state of mine which seeks out other states of mind [p. 35] Here mind is conceived of as fundamentally dyadic, not seeking s end in itself, As Bion’s interpersonslization of the concept of projec tive identification became increasingly central to Kleinian thinking, psychic life has been located increasingly in the interactive field th other. This fication through the use of others, but secking out others as an between individuals and their reeiprocal impaet on trend approaches Faivbair s concept of libido as “object-seeking. “The patient in the contemporary Kleinian literature is portrayed not as simply pursuing infantile gratifications, regressing to infantile states, or maintaining his own equilibrium, with the analyst observing from a detached and neutral perch. The patient is portrayed as intensely engaged with the analyst in the here-and-now, as hyperaware of the analyst and the details oftheir interaction, as desperately need- ing to push and pull the analyst into states of mind essential to the patient's sense of safety. Inthe contemporary Kleinian literature, the best way foran analyst to learn about a patient is no longer through an interpretive examina- tion of the patient's free associations, but through a self-reflective awareness of the patient’s impact on the analyst. ‘Thus, Joseph (1989) suggests that our understanding ofthe nature and the level of anxiety isinteslinked, and depends, i large part, ou our corvect assessment ofthe use that the patient is making of us... frequently the guide in the transference, sto where the most important anxiety is, lies in an awareness that, in some part of oneself, one can feel an area in the patient's communies- tions that one wishes not o attend to [p. 111]120 = cHALTER 4 ‘The analyst explores her own experience for pockets of anxiety, and it is there, Joseph suggests, that the most important information about the patient's transference may lie In addition to the analyst's own experience in the eountertransfer= ence, contemporary Klcinians also stress the importance of the patient's perceptions and fantasies about the analyst. The patient is not simply using the analyst asa projective screen for his own dlynam- ies. The patient is deeply and intently embedded in interactions with f real person in the actual present. As Pick (1985) has put it, the patient “will take in, consciously or unconsciously, some idea ofthe analyst as a eal person” (p. 36), For contemporary Kleinians, explor- ing the patients ideas about that person are erucial to understanding, what is going on: I would then wish to explore most carefully her picture of me, this ol, supposedly lonely rather embittered person, and her quiet conviction of what Las like, ancl ouly very slowly anc! over a long period, hope w explore how much of these ide 1 might be Finked with aetwal obser jow much projected parts of herself, and 80 on. «To assume that al these ideas were projections, from the heyinning would almost certainly be inaccurate, would rumb ‘one’s sensitivity as to what was going on... [Joseph, 1989, p. 148]. vations of myself or the way Ii Al similar lines, Racker (1968) regards the contertransference yst’s most important instrument for exploring the patients dlynamies. The patient’s experience is half an interactive unit; the patict’s ideas about what is happening in the other half of that unit area route into the patient’s deepest hopes and fears, Thus, Racker suggests, the est way to explore the patient's transference is to explore the patients fantasies about the countertransference. For Racker and other contemporary Kleinian writers, the tradi tional exelusive focus on the intrapsychic has been broadened into a perspective in which the intrapsychic dynamics of the patient get acted out in the interpersonal field between the patient ancl the ama- Iyst, offen surfacing in the intrapsychic experience of the analyst. The analyst's actions, interpretive and otherwise, are not divine interven tions from afar, but are experienced always within the interactiveInteraction in the Kleinian Tradition » 121 context of the analytic relationship. Thus, O'Shaughnessy (1982) notes that “it is now widely held that, instead of being about the patient’s intrapsychic dynamics, interpretations should be about the interaction of patient and analyst at an intrapsychic level” (p. 139). ‘The Centrality of Interpretation In the intensely rivalrous analytic world of the past several decades, all-important lines of thought have been developed in the context of competing approaches. The more influential an analytic school becomes, the more scrutiny and criticism itis subjected to. Analytic authors virtually never grant any credit to thei critics, yet itis appar- ent that theoretical positions are often stretched and enriched by responding to and, in some cases, assimilating some of the arguments of their erties. Thus, in the intense polarization between the Freudians and the Kohutians during the 1970s and 1980s in the United States, the Freudians were criticized for not grasping the importance of ‘empathy, and the Kohutians were criticized for underemphasizing the place of aggression. In recent years, empathy has become an increas- ingly common term in the Freudian literature, and self psychologists struggle increasingly to develop a self:psychological approach to aggression Phe Kleinians were severely criticized during the 1950s and 1960s for overemphasizing the power of interpretation. Freud (1910) had established the technical importance of timing in the delivery of interpretations—the analyst ought to interpret only material whose derivatives were already in the preconscious. This means that one speaks only to intentions, feelings, and processes that the patient is capable of recognizing as his. Anna Freud extended this approach in her work with children, who, because of their immature egos, were regarded as incapable of using deep interpretations and requir auxiliary support. This emphasis on timing was greatly elaborated in, Freudian ego psychology (Blanck and Blanck, 1974) into an analytic technique in which interpretations were very carefully controlled and titrated. The patient's mind was envisioned (in a spatial metaphor) as, complexly layered, and analytic interpretations were to be addressed_ ——. 122 « cHapren 4 only to the surface, to the active resistances. Deep interpretations wore regarded ay at best ineffective, at worst cangerous Klein's approach to interpretation was shaped in her early work with very disturbed children, In contrast to Anna Freud, Klein felt that intense anxiety was most elfectv. interpretations, but by interpret ly assuayed not by withholding the point ofthe deepest anxiety f She felt that subsequent developments in the chile’ play suggest t he is able to hear and use even interpretations of the most primitiv. and tertifying phantasies. Thus, a very different kind of interpretive activity developed! in the Kleinian school. (See Grosskorth, 1986, for an account of this controversy.) When a Freudian ego psychologist makes an interpretation, she envisions herself reaching the most adult dimension of the patient, creating an alliance with his observing egos when the Kleinian makes, am interpretation, she envisions herself as bypassing the patient's eyo and making contact with the most primitive infantile wishes and dreads, The utility of an interpretation for the ego psychologist is, measured in terms ofits recognizability; the utility ofan interpretation for the Kleinian is measured in terms of its impact on the patient's anxiety. This is why Kleinian analysts were characterized either adniingly or mockingly (depending on who was doing the charac terizing) as “speaking direetly to the mcons In the Kleinian literature of the 1950s and 1960s, the analyst was portrayed asa whirlwind of interpretive activity? Interpretations of carly infantile wishes and phantasies, often of very sadistic nature, were mucle very quickly (often in the beginning ofthe initial consulta tion) and with great rapidity thereafter. This was probably the most severely criticized feature of Kleinian technique and responsible for the largely negative perception of the Kleinian schoo! in the United Theres a passage ina paper by Movey-Kyte (195) that hates the lsc! Klin prin of aking herpes ll nes“ hgh he tcp baln pant, parts of hin el ne Bu eat tery are of thi, or other terprett site”. 27). escems ms | egy ing that wot beings sure of what he was talking, naking interpretations, or of framing what he was offering as speculations rath thaw interpretations,Interaction in the Kleinian Tradition » 123 States until recently.’ Grenson (1974), for example, contrasting his ‘own measured, careful ego-psychological interpretations to the Kleinian approach, suggested that the latter demands of the patient tnasochistie surrender to the analysts interpretations. Better finetion- ing patients leave immediately; more primitive, masochistic patients remain and submit. Pavt of what is new in the contemporary Kleinian approach has derived from a creative response to this criticism, Racker (1968) pre- figured this response in his exploration of what he termed the patient’s “relationship to the interpretation,” and ithas been devel- ‘oped with great perspicacity and refinement by Joseph (1989). What is central to these new developments is a concern with the patient's capacity to use interpretations. ‘As we have noted, for Klein and her contemporaries, the patient's capacity effectively to use analytic interpretations was presumed. Kl believed that there was a channel through which the small child directly perceives the parents ina realistic fashion, bypassing severe early introjects; similarly, Klein believed that there was a chanmel through which the an Iytic patient recognizes the analyst’s interpretations as benign and helpfal, bypassing severe transferential anxieties and phantasies. What was pre- sumed in early Klcinian thinking is now called into question. ‘Thus, Joseph (1989) focuses on the patient’ ability t hea, recognize, and effec tively use interpretations in a fishion that has traditionally been the province of Freudian ego psychology: ‘This patient 8. had almost no part of her ego available for understand ing—she was operating in a more primitive way, her defences being, used to struggle against facing psychic reality. I would not therefore feel it to be of value to her, at that point, to do anything other than 7 luis this technical approach that makes Winnicot’s book Holding and Interpretation (1986) so shocking to many American readers. Winnicott was trained as a Kleinian and remained heavily influenced by Kleinian technique throughout his career. This was not apparent in most ofhis writings, composed of short papers and abbreviated vignettes. In Holding and Interpretation, the reader is presented with an extended account ofa treatment, often verbatim, and the sheer multitude and complexity of the interpretations are quite startling.124s CHAPTER 4 bogin to build up a picture of her unconscious defenses and the kind of | person that I think she unconsciously experienced me to he [p. 121] ‘This kind of careful delineation of layers of resistances stems from a view of the patient in which primitive defenses dominate the trans- ference and subsume the patient's entire experience of the analyst, including the analyst’s interpretive activity. If the patient lives in a (paranoid-schizoid) world that is fundamentally split between good and evil, the analyst's interpretations themselves will be slotted into one or the other category, as divine revelation to he worshipped or poison to be dreaded. In recent years, the concept of “pathological organizations” has been added to the classical Kleinian notions of the paranoid-schizoid and depressive positions to characterize highly defensive configura tions of internal and external object relations, Rosenfeld (1965, 1987) has provided vivid descriptions of malignant, narcissistic and perverse organizations, and Steiner (1993) has explored various forms of des- perate “psychic retreats.” In this new literature, once again, the omnipotent power assigned to interpretation in the elassical Kleinian cra has been diminished. The analyst may intend his interpretation to bea set of ideas to be considered and reflected upon, but the patient is no way of doing that. As Steiner (1993) has put it, “The analyst needs to understand that in this phase there is no question of interest- ing the patient in understanding in the usual analytic sense since his [the patient’s] priority isto find his equilibrium” (p. 215)."Thus, in contemporary Kleinian thought, the capacity to use interpretations, rather than being presumed, is considered a developmental ment, continually lost and only episodically regained. The recent rethinking of the nature of interpretation reflects a two- person v analytic situation. In the classical Freudian and early Kleinian view, the analyst is outside the patient’s dynamics, unaffected by them and delivering interpretations about them, Now the analyst is unclerstood as embedded in the anxi- eties and pressures of the patient's dynamies (ofien located inside the analyst through projective identification). ‘The analyst’ interpretive activity is now understood in the context ofthe analyst's own struggle with those anxieties and pressures. hieve- w ofthe interactive nature of thInteraction in the Kleinian Tradition + 125 “Thus, new kind of question has emerged with regard to the ing of the analyst’s interpretations: Why is the analyst interpreting now? Rapid, early interpretations are now understood as possibly reflecting the analyst’s anxiety and difficulty in containing the patient’s terrors and fantasies. Interpretive activity, rather than open ing up a channel to the unconscious, may enable the analyst and the intellectualizing patient collusively to distract themselves from the patient's deeper dreads. As Joseph (1989) puts it, (in contrast to Money-Kyrle, [1955]), ifthe analyst actully struggles in such situations to give detailed inter pretations of the meaning of individual associations then she i living, ‘out the patient’s own defensive system, making pseudo-sense of the incomprehensible, rather than trying to make contace with the patients experience of living in an incomprehensible would. The latter can be a very disturbing experience forthe analyst, too. It is more comfortable tobe ‘mother who cannot understand her infant understands ‘materia? than to live out the role of a tient [p. 158} ‘Thus, contemporary Kleinian authors emphasize the inevitable intensity of the analyst's experience in the countertrausference. Strong passions, rather than being regarded as evidence of the analyst’s own need for further analysis, are regarded as a constructive necessity in the analyst’s efforts to know her patient deeply and help him contain and reown the pieces of his experience, which he continually frag- ments and projects into others. In order to help the patient contain frightening pieces of his own experience, the analyst has to be able to tolerate containing those projected pieces rather than trying to pass them back instantly, like a “hot potato,” through interpretations. The necessary “emotional closeness” of the analyst to the patient now seen as predictably uncomfortable for the analyst (Malcolm, 1986, p.78), and there is the perpetual danger that the analyst will deal with her anxieties by making interpretations 50 as to regain con- trol. Thus, in this contemporary Kleinian view, the question must always be raised! whether the function ofthe analyst’ interpretation is to convey to the patient, “You are the sick one here, and I am the ana lyst. These crazy anxieties and phantasies are in you, not in me.” Not126 = CHAPTER 4 only is it no longer presumed that the patient has a transference-free receptor site in which to receive analytic interpretations it is no longer presumed that the analyst has a countertransference-free source within her own experience from which to generate interpreta- tions. Britton and Steiner (1994) have detailed the ways in which an “overvalued idea” in the form of an interpretation drawn from the analyst’s doctrinal beliefs can lend false “sense of integration to oth crwise disparate and confusing experiences ... the facts being forced to fitan hypothesis or theory which the analyst needs for defensive purposes” (p. 1070). ‘Thus, what is now taken into account is the funetion of the inter= pretation for the patient, the way in which the patient is able to relate to and use interpretations, aud the function of the interpreta- tion for the analyst, that is, the way in whieh the analyst uses her interpretive activity in the context of her inevitable countertransfer- cenice struggles. Our healthier patients will soon be able to tell us ifthey feel, rightly or wrongly, that an interpretation suggests that we are on the defensive and interpreting accordingly. In our work with anxiety we not only have to maintain that we can stand our patients’ projections, we act ally have to do so [Joseph 1989, p. 112} At this point in the evolution of Kleinian thinking about interpre ion and other aspects of theory and technique, we find a tich miix- ture of traditional principles and innovative thinking. Although Fairbairn and Winnicott are virtually never divectly cited, their ver= sions of object relations theories have had a elear impact on conten- porary Kleinian thought, We can discern Fairbairn’s influence in the notions of pathological organizations and psychic retreats. The «epic tions ofthe paranoid-schizoid and depressive positions, which domi- nated the classical Klcinian literature, were standard, generic configurations with standard, generic objects (good and bad breasts, good and bad penises, etc.). Pathological organizations and psychic retreats are much more custom designed internal worlds, drawn from experiences with real people at crucial clevelopmental phases, very much like Faitbaimn’s depiction of closed internal worlds composed ofInteraction in the Kleinian Tradition «127 attachments to internalized bad objects. There is, for example, stk ing similarity between Rosenfeld’s (1987) depiction of a malevolent internal “gang” in pathological, malignaut narcissism and Pairbairn’s (1958, p. 385) depiction of the patient's transferencial efforts to press-gang” the analyst into pathological internal object relations, Winnicow’s influence is even more palpable. In the classical Kleinian literature, the emphasis was generally on aggression and its vicissitudes, with primitive destructiveness and envy presumably emerging spontaneously out of an excess of constitutional aggression. Increasingly in the contemporary Kleinian literature, envy and aggres- sion ate recontextualized as reactions to and flights from dependency and its attendant anxieties. It is the desperate effort to ward off depressive anxiety consequent to the dependent object relation that is regarded as the well-spring of destructiveness. Thus, Spillius (1993) has redefined envy as a defense against “acknowledging the acute pain and sense of loss, sometimes fear of psychic collapse, that would come from realizing that one wants a good object but really feels that one does not or has not had it” (p.154) And the kind of maternal fune- tions Winnicott regarded as essential to the analyst's role have found their way increasingly into the Kleinian literature. For example, Money-Kyrle (1955) speaks of the analyst's reparative and parental functions, in taking care of an immature part of the self that needs to be protected from a sadistic part. This nurturative dimension of the analyst’s activities has been extended by Pick (in very Winnicottian tone), who notes that “whether one knows it or not, the interpretation will contain some projection of our own wish to protect the baby from the sadistic part. The maintenance ofa careful setting is in some way a demonstration of this care?’ (p.41) Despite the absorption of these innovations, several important principles with roots in the classical Kleinian mode still hold sway in their contemporary literature and shape the distinctively Kleinian approach to interaction, 1, Although the analyst is now portrayed not as a detached observer but as alfectively embedded in and struggling with the same powerful affects and conflicts as the patient, the analyst is still granted the power to discriminate the real from the fantastic and projected. Ashase emaprnn 4 Schafer (1997) has put it, “These Kleinians remain objectivist or real- ist in their phenomenology. They consistently present their material as though they are in the position of purely independent observers- even of their own countertransferences” (p. 19).’Thus, the fandamen- tal asymmetry of the traditional psychoanalytic assignment of epistemological powers is preserved: the patient is regarded as too much at the mercy of his own dlynamies to know what is real, while the analyst is positioned, by the very definition of her role, with the capacity to sort out the actual from the distorted, 2. Although the analyst is now often portrayed! as nudged, through the patie nee, into subtle and unwitting enactments of countertransferential pressures (even in the very act of interpreting), the (anil) ideal ofa clean, uncontaminated nonparticipation is gener ally still preserved. With each new set of papers by the more progres- sive contemporary Kleinian authors, one can sense the struggle between the new clinical awareness of interaction and an old, rigid technical post asing awareness of the ways in which the analyst is embedcled in the patient's dynamics and the ways in which that embeddedness can be used by the analyst to understand the patient's projections and frame appropriate transference interpre tations. But a valiant effort is made to preserve the classical distinetion between thought (or feelings) and actions. In the countertransference, the analyst inevitably experiences the patient’s conflictual emotions, including intense impulses to act.’ These experiences are useful, both to provide the patient with the experience of being contained and to provide the analyst with material for interpreting. But, as much as possible, the analyst should refrain from actually acting, $0 as to keep the transference uncontaminated. John Steiner (1993) and Michael Feldman (1997a, b) have pro- vided vivid descriptions of the analyst caught in the countertransfer~ nce in double-hinding dllemmas hetween choices of reenacting the roles of fantasied idleal objects or critical bad objects. They even sug- gest that some degree of enactment of these roles is inevitable, But, unlike their counterparts in the American relational literature (Aron, Bromberg, Davies, Hoffman, Spezzano), they regard the analysts actual participation in such interactions as regrettable and see no value in transference-countertransference interaction followed by Ps transferInteraction in the Kleinian Tradition = 129 collaborative self-reflection, As of this writing, Pick has come closest to such a convergence with American relational theorizing: My stress is that, within the analyst as well, spontaneous emotional interaction with the patient’s projections takes place, and that if we fally respect this and are not too dominated by the demane for impec: cable neutrality, we can make beter use ofthe experience for interpre- tation [p. 43}. It is noteworthy that even for Pick, despite her emphasis on the patient’s scarch for and awareness of the analyst asa real person, the “spontaneous emotional interaction” takes place, or should take place, only inside the analyst’s mind, not in actua tional” interchange with the patient. “spontaneous emo: ‘Thus, in the contemporary Kleinian literature, as in the classical Kleinian literature, the beliefis preserved that in performing his tradi- tional analytic function, the analyst rises above the patient’s projected affects and conflicts and is experienced by the patient in just that way. In this sense, there isa preservation of the traditional assumption that, ‘when the analyst acts properly analytic, he is invisible and that there- fore the patient’s experience of the analyst in the transference ia revealed, like a bas-relief, against a neutral background. Despite the radical shifts and reconceptualizations in many features of Josep! (1989) contributions, we can see the importance to her of maintaining this ideal: Theres always a problem as to how to keep the trans ed—not, oF minimally, contninated by he a verbally, in tone or aitude, and 40 on Is clear that we are demand ing that the analyst should be able to feel and exploxe most carefully the whole range of disturbance and yet not atout and not masochist cally suffer without verbalizing [p. 148] nce unconta ie acting out 3. Although the patient is no longer assumed to be able to hear interpretations directly, outside his own dynamics, contemparary Kleinians tend to assume that, when the analyst makes an interpreta- tion about the patient’s relationship to interpretations, this interpreta tion is grasped in some direct, unmediated fashion,1.et us say that a patient who is chronically ensconced in the para noid-schizoid organization hears the analyst’ interpretations ay dan- gerous attacks. Mr. X, for example, would respond to virtually anything interpretive that was sail to him with, es, have thought of that, and..." The analyst’s experience was of having his state- rents instantly miniaurred into familiar clichés. It was never possible for the analyst to have a thought that Mr. X had not already thought about for along time, Mr. X could never he srprised. Nothing new could ever happen. Mr. X ahvays remained in control In the classical Kleiniau literature, the assumption would be made hat the analysts interpretaic is nevertheless are able to get through, Despite the ego's defenses and! resistances, the unconscious resonates with the analyst's correct understanding, In the conlemportry Klcinian literature, by contrast it would be assumed that the patient's paranoid-schizoid organization, pathological organizations, and naanie defenses create a wall thre igh which the analysts interpretae tions carmot penetrate, The patient experiences the analyst's interpre tations as dangerous attacks and dlisarms thein accordingly. What is the analyst to do? ‘The analyst should make an interpretation about the patient’ rela tionship to the interpretations (or what Joseph, 1989, cally the “immediate situation” ancl what Steiner, 1995, refers to as shifis etween pathological and healthier organizations). ‘The patient should be shown that he experiences the analyst's interpretations is dangerous and how he processes them to neutralize them, ‘The assumption is made that no interpretations will be patient as interpretations except-—and this is tion interpretations about the patie weard by the important © ep ’s relationship to the interpre {ations, The assumption that in most situations the patient is like able ws heat interpretations about his relatio is a central feature of the contempa hip to interpreta ty Kleinia approach to inter iow ancl distinguishes that approach from other current models The Non: ‘gotiability of the “Analytic Frame” Schafer (1997), characterizing contemporary Kleinians as Kleinian Freudians, has emphasized tha, i adel on to their loyalty to Freud,~~ — - Interaction in the Kleinian Tradition » 131 “they rely on interpretation and scrupulously attempt to avoid other 4 types of intervention” (p. xii). But I noted in Chapter 2 that “interpre eo | tation” is a word whose meanings have become gradually transformed i ‘ory of psychoanalytic ideas. We are not pe really told much when a theorist states his allegiance to the principle of interpretation. We need to know what he chinks interpretations ave andl what happens when the analyst delivers one. ‘The Kleinian understanding of “interpretation” has been almost completely transformed by the gradual but remarkably extensive elab- oration of the concept of projective identification (in Bion’s interper sonalized terms). Traditionally interpretations were understood to be delivered by a largely detached analyst reading the patient’s free asso- ciations. Now, interpretations are understood to be preceded by the i analyst’s reception and containment of the patient's projective identi- fications, which she discerns significantly through a self-reflective exploration of her own experience. Originally, projective identification was understood solely as a defensive process. Increasingly, projective identification has been understood to have expressive and communicative aspects. As these latter functions have been given more weight, the containment aspect of projective identification has become increasingly significant. If the patient is regarded as unconsciously intending to rid himself of unwanted mental content by fantasizing its relocation into the mind of the analyst, a relatively rapid interpretation of that defense might be appropriate. But, if the patient is unconsciously trying to teach the ualyst something about the patients experience, orto enlist the ana- Iyst’s aid in holding features of himself he is tevified of mi his own mind, the analyst’s rapid interpretation might very well be perceived as a rejection of the patient’s need for containment, a failure ofa necessary, quasi-parental function. In this sense, the contempo- rary Klcinian notion of “containment” is very similar to the Winnicottian notion of “holding.” The analyst needs to convey not just an interpretive understanding of what is projected, but a willing- ness and capacity to provide experiences of “holding” necessary for the patient’s security and equilibrium. As Steiner (1993) has put it, over the course of the such containment depencls on the analyst's capacity to recogaia cope with what the patient has projected and with his own countertransference reactions to it, Experience suggests that such contain ment is weakened ifthe analyst perseveres in interpreting or explain- ing to the patient what he is thinking, feeling, or doing, ‘The patient experiences such interpretations as a lack of containment and feels projected elements back inty him. The patient has projected these precisely hecause he could wot enje with tat dhe analyst is pushing th then, and lis immediate need is tor thea to continue to reside in the analyst and to be understood in their projected state |p. 373] But how shall the analyst conta the analyst to convey to the pai tion? It is here that the contemporary Kleinians’ adherence to the most concrete application of classical theory of technique seems greatly to reduce their options. Analysts interpret, or they remain silent. Steiner, Feldman, and other innovators within this tradition regard interpretation as sometimes experienced by the patient as a failure of the analyst's containment function, But what else can the analyst do other than interpret or remain silent? Steiner (1993) illustrates this problem in dra argues that, because the patient maintains his own e tributing various fragments of his own mental content into the mind of the analyst the pati n the paticut’s projections? Hew is nt his willingness to serve that fane ¢ fashion. He silbrium by dis- t holds many beliefs about what is going on in the analyst's mine! that are often extremely important to explore. He illustrates the ways in which this exploration can be accomplished through what he calls “analyst-centered,” as opposed to “patient centered” interpretations. Analyst-centered interpretations take the form of statements like: “You experience me as . Por “You are altacl that I...” or “You were relieved when I... (p. 374), and so on Steiner presents clinical material illustrating some ver houghtfil interpre interesting and tions of what he speculates are the patient's unconscious phantasies about the analyst’ experiences he gauges the accuracy of these interpretations by what he takes to be rises and falls of the patient’s anxiety TWwo features of this approach seem remarkable to me. First, although Steiner’s intent is largely to convey to the patient his capa ity to contain her projections, to let her know that he is really with her and struggling constructively to work with her needs of him, lie never —¥Interaction in the Kleinian Tradition » 133 says anything about his wn thoughts or feelings about his experience swith her, Despite the effort to bring in the analyst as a second person in the process, who realy is affected by and reciprocally shaping the in terms of interpretive pre- process, everything needs to be frame Sumptions about the patient’ thoughts. To my ear, this locks the ana~ Iyst into a strange reversal ofthe old joke about the narcissist who sucldenly says to his conversational captive, “E tne about yourself, What o you think about» ‘lent or make interpretive statements fal containment of the feels he can only either be struggles to signal to the patient his sueces patient’s projections by conveying something like: “Enough of my raking interpretive statements about what is going on in your mind Let's talk about my mind, Here's what gow think is happening in my mind.” Second, it does not seem to have occurred to Steiner to ash the patient about his own experience of the analyst. Presumably such {questions would represent departure from the strictly neutral and hhierachical framework within which he feels itis necessary to locate the analyst's interpretive function. This approach can be contrasted to the kind of interpetsonal/relational methodology developed by Blechner (1992) and Aron (1996) who similarly regard the patient's beliefs about the analyst's experience as important, but who attempt to develop that material by questions aimed at encouraging patients to explore their conscious and unconscious fantasies. ‘At this point in the evolution of their clinical practice, the contem: poraty Kleinians exploration of the interactive features of the analytic process seem to run into the brick wall of waditional injunctions Igainst any behavior other than interpretations and silence as legiti- rate analytic functions. As Steiner (1988) puts it Using all the means available, including selF- observation, the observa tion of his actions, the responses of the patient, and the overall atmos- phere of the session, the analyst can arrive at some kind of ind of his interaction with him. Ifthe understanding of his patient a analyst can stand the pressure, he can use this understanding to for- ulate an interpretation that allows the patient to feel understood and contained [p-385]Hohe cmapren 4 As we noted in the preceding chapter the interpersonal tradition has available other “means” for exploring interaction. This marks a eru- cial difference with regard to the ways in which analytic interaction is understood and the technical options through whit the analyst par ticipates in the analytic relationship. A key principle maintained throughout both classical andl conter: porary Kleinian thought and distinguishing the Freudian anid the cou temporary (or Freudian) Kteinians from major wends in relational approaches is that the analytic situation has a fixed and universal ‘unconscious meaning forall patients. This principle is erucial to the way in which Klcinian analysts frame dlnical choices in tense moments, The analytic situation is understood within the Kleinfan tradition (© constitute a re-creation ofthe patient's relationship with the pri mary object, the breast. Whatever else is going om (anid many other things are understood to be going on), the patient seeks the analysts help and experiences the analyst asthe breast that is necessary for suse taining life. The analyst's interpretations, whatever else they are, are also, atthe deepest level, the mother’s milk that the patient desper ately seeks and needs. Thus, Joseph (1989) typically describes the y in which the patient’s anxiety centers on the dangers she feels because of her position as the helpless, dependent recipient of the analyst/mother’s ministrations. We can see what this movement achieves in terms of his cits out any rel relationship between the patient sad myse! analyst snl patient, as mothe ance. It {between nd chill, as a feeding couple, le obvi ates any separate existence, aay relating ship in which he takes in divectly from me [p. 173]. Note the assumptions and eq ations in this vision: there is relationship hetween patient and analyst, and it consists of the rel tionship between a mother and child—a nursing mother and child. “This isa very powerful organizing metaphor for viewing analytic imteraction, and it underlies a great deal of the linieal ustration in contemporary Kleinian literata e. But itis very important to grasp that within the Kleinian tradition this is not understood ws a metaphor at all, The patients relationship with the analyst is wot like the baby's +Interaction in the Kleinian Tradition » 135 relationship with the breast; at the deepest unconscious levels, the analyst is the breast for the patient and the analyst’s interpretations dare good or bad milk or both." ‘This assumption anchors the contemporary Kleinian approach to many current controversies regarding analytic technique. Should the analyst disclose her experience in the countertransference? Should the analyst ever depart from a strictly interpretive stance to meet a patient's request, respond to a patient’s needs? ‘The answer to these ‘questions is necessarily no. All departures from the traditional ana- Iytic functions of listening (and now containing) and interpr by definition, an acting out of countertransferential pressures. The analyst, simply by virtue of being an interpreting analyst, is assumed to have a universal, generic meaning for the patient as the primary object (breast) offering potentially life-giving sustenance (interpretations/milk). Because of anxieties over his dependency on that primary object, the patient will do anything and everything to destroy its goodness. Efforts to get the analyst to depart from the traditional analytic stance by disclosing her own experience, reveal- ing information about her own life, satisfying patient's wishes through means other than interpretations—these ate all attempts to spoil the analyst as the primary object, to destroy her potential to offer the sustenance/interpretations that the patient so deeply longs for, feels so clesperately dependent on and therefore is so much at the mercy of, Thus, Kleinian thinking about these kinds of clinical situations and issues almost always centers on the injunction that the analyst stand firm” in her analyzing function. The key assumption here is that, when the analyst is standing firm (by not disclosing or not grat fying noninterpretively), this aet can be presumed to have a universal meaning to all patients. Whatever else the patient experiences (for example, that the analyst is fearfully hiding, sadistically torturing, and gare, 8. Joseph (1989) provides many vivid examples of this equation: “I have hhad ample material to show him that words are seen as an extension of his tongue, which he feels he excitedly rubs against the analysis as the breast, hop ing to excite it, me, eather than use the interpretations, nipple, and take in thet contents" (p. 63),136 « GHAPTER 4 so on), at a deep, unconscious level the patient equates the analytie situation with the primary object relation. "The analyst can maintain her analytic funetion and her interpretive potency only by standing firm because there is a deep correspondence between the analyst's or and activity (traditionally defined) and the patient's prewired, universal image ofthe good breast. Michael Feldman (1993) recently addressed this issue directly in an elegant argument in favor of the analyst’s preserving a traditional, purely interpretive stance. In recent years, several Kleinian authors have sttempted to broaden the customary emphasis on the nursing couple and build bridges to mainstream Freudian thought by reintro ducing oedipal themes. Feldman argues that the analyst universally represents, in the patient’s unconscious mind, not just the breast but also the oedipal couple, By attempting to draw the analyst into nonin- terpretive interactions, the patient is not just trying to omnipotently control the primary object (the breast), but also trying to seduce the ‘oedipal parent into a betrayal of her spouse and an incestuous inti- anaey with the patient (as oedipal child). Ifthe patiewt feels that the veassurance he seeks has been achieved by drawing the analyst into the enetment of his wishes, I suspect this ‘always iavolves de Fantasy of having separated the analyst from those ‘objects or functions that offer him balance and perspective, firms the patient's belief in his omnipotence, with the accompanying, anxiety and! guilt, More importantly, perhaps; it confirms the presence (externally aud internally) of a weak and unsupported figure from whom he is unable to actually gain reassurance. This may, of course, reinforce the need to go on using projective mechanisins, to defend against the confrontation with a weak and divided parental couple, or their representation inthe analyst's mind [pp. 340-341). Gr Bee Pla Roth ant Hanna Sega (1990) fora discussion along jst these lines ofa cae in wich the analyst. woking ina sel-pycholgial an ties chose to answer the pal abst the analyst, “On ify the per survive her demanding attacks asa functioning analyst confirms in her mind her omnipotence and leaves her in despair” (p- 49). aalyst's survival as a functioning analyst ean mod ory guilt inked with her omnipotence... the analysts failure toS y Interaction in the Kleinian Tvadition «137 | For Feldman, there is only one gemuinely analytic way of reassur oe ing the patient—by the analyst's holding fast to her interpretive fane- a ' tion. By acting as an interpreting analyst, traditionally defined, the ln | analyst resonnates with and reaffirms the universal images in the oN i" | patient’s mind of a robust primary object (good breast) and a reliable io" parental couple, ain the restoration ofan oedipal configuration in which both parents are jo allowed a relationship with one another as well as withthe child. ‘The hos Snalyat is thon allowed a complex relationship with diferent parts of ins How ain and different versions ofthe ptient with whom hes ei" dealing The intmalzation ofthis configuration enables the patient to aly achieve a greater degree af integration between different clements of bt his own personality and, ultimately, a genuine experience ofreassur- Gi ance [p.341} ty the Epistemological controversies (traditional psychoanalytic posi- tiviom versus hermeneutics and constructivism) are often argued ona very abstract plain, But how the analyst understands the nature of her own knowledge and the claims she makes fort has an enormous, very impact on the w es her participation in the relationship. ‘Phe Kleinians claim to know the (universal) ning of the analyst’s activities for all patients. Whatever else the ‘dis speaking about, he is, most fundamentally, positioning is the analyst as primary object and as an oedipal cow c. This assumption underlies the almost exclusive focus on the here-and-now transference in contemporary Kleinian literature. As Schafer (1997) has pointed out, approvingly, this entails the treatment life, past and pre ofall other extraanalytic features of the analysancls sent, as manifest content for expressing transferential anxieties and conflicts “as an atena in which the problems of the internal world are represented and played out” (p.3) This is strong assumption—that analysts know what their actions ean to their patients inevitably and universally, lespite whatever the tients may think they mean,” Ifyou buy this assumption, it makes TO. This sort ofapprouch to the analytic “frame” as essential and universal was also developed in the work of Robert Langs (1979).138 = CHAPTER 4 perfect sense to preserve the nalytic frame along traditional lines, claiming for the analyst’s understanding the elevated properties of cutrality and objectivity. If you make this assumption, you operate according to what Schafer (1997) has termed a (p. 3) with regard to whatever the patient says, thinks, and feels. Ifyou make this assumption, you stake out a powerful position in your inter actions with the patient and interpret the patieut’s efforts to question that position or engage you i other ways as clestructively mnotivated resistances to your analytic Fanetion. If you make this asstmption, you gauge the correctness of your interpretations not by anything the patient says in response, but by the rise or fall of anxiety, which pre. sumably reflects the impact of the interpretation on the patient's inter nal object world. It is precisely this assumption that has been challe spectivis Lin the per- onstructivism of contemporary relational authors, who regard the meaning of the analyst for the analysand not as given and universal (and known to the analyst) but as indivilually constructed, developed, and negotiated between analysand and analyst, Merton Gills (1983b, 1994) contributions have been extremely important on this point. What the analyst kinks she is doing is not the same thing as the meaning to the patient of what she is doing, There is a leap etween m ning in the analyst’s miud and the meaning for the patient, An analyst who thinks she is warm and reassuring migh? be experienced in this way, or she might he experienced as fawning and desperate. Conversely, the analyst who is “standing firm” according to their idea of a robust primary objector a healthy oedipal couple might be experienced this way by a patient. But they might also be experi- enced, plausably, depending on the patient’ history of relationships with significant others, as rigid, brittle, and sadlistically uncaring. Gonsider a striki example (of assuming the meaning to the patient of the analyst’s participation) drawn from an extended case discussion by Herbert Rosenfeld (1987). Rosenfeld believes that the patient, Adam, was involved in various tricks to seduce the analyst away from the truth contained in the lattes interpretations His only hope to he analyzed suecessilly was if he had an analyst who would remain firm in spite of his constant attempts at seduction. Itssines Interaction in the Kleinian Tradition «139 seemed he was angry anx! envious of the firmness he needed from me to enable him to give up his narcissistic omnipotence... Adam cid not acknowledge that I was right, But the next day he «told me a ‘dream, In ita colleague of his, who is in analysis with me, had six holes drilled into his bones because I as.a surgeon tried to find cysts although near eo: there. No eysts could be found, but the patien lapse, was very brave. There were no associations to this dream. The rother cavfication to show the ticks Adam was play olved a wishful trans: touching very dream seemed at that time, formation of the truth, Ic recognized that I had beet prceisely on some of Adam's more serious problems, and this he 1 he was prow and brave because he was 1m seemed to have in ‘wanted to deny Inthe de coping so well with the suffering caused for him by a bad analysis, bn avoiding the pain of realizing, [p.69} fact he behaved much more as if he wa T was locating his problems precis For Rosenfeld, whatever else the patient might transferentially experi ‘ence the analyst as up to, he also experiences the analyst asa good! pri- inary object on whom he conflictually depends for substinance/ interpretations ofthe truth. As long as Rosenfeld does not feel he is cting in” sadistically in the countertransference (of which he assumes he is the ultimate arbiter), the patient’ experience that he is having his bones drilled ean only be a resistance to the truth" Ina relational approach, in contrast, the analyst does not minimize the importance of unconscious meanings of the analyst’ both the analysand and the analyst. But she does not pres know what these are. Meanings is co-created and negotia TI. Rosenfel's papers vividly exemplify the tension in the eon Kleinian Fierature between a two-person understanding (°T want to stress agai. ancl again thatthe analysis is nota one-sided process but an interaction between two people?" p. 272) and a one-person technique 3. Schafer’s (1997) position om these issues is particularly interesting, because, with his hermeneutic, navrative-based methodology he cannot realy Datieve thatthe analyst knows, in some unmediated way, what meanings realy lie tv the patient's mind, Meanings and narratives are constructed, both by patient and by analyst. Yet, Schafer endorses the “policy of suspicion,” in which the putin narrtive-based experince ofthe aualyst and other features of reality are140 = cuAPTER 4 A recent essay on envy by Elizabeth Bott Spillius (1993) sheds some interesting light on the place of envy in the patient’s feelings about the analys. Spillius derives envy not, as Klein did, from an excess of constitutional aggression but from the interpersonal context in which the patient was and is given to: “One crucial factor seems to ie to be the conscious and unconscious feelings of the giver about giving, and the way these feelings are perceived! or misperceived, con- sciously and unconsciously, by the receiver” (p. 164). She explores a range of subtle but crucial differences in the ways in which being «given to can be experienced. In one case, she asks the reader to “sup- pose that the giver gives eagerly and with pleasure, but only in order to demonstrate his superiority over the receiver” (p. 165). Although Spillius does not systematically apply this framework to the analytic relationship, itis extremely thought provoking to do so. What kind of giver does the patient experience the analyst as being? What is the patient’s sense of the analyst’s attitudes, conscious and unconscious, toward giving things, including interpretations, to the patient? Relational theorists put enormous emphasis on a “inut- ality” between the participants in the analytic relationship (see, espe- cially, Aron, 1996.) Some authors (Bromberg, 1996; Slavin and Kriegman, in press) have argued that itis essential to a successful ana lytic process that the patient have an experience of the analyst as changing on the patient’s behalf; others (Searles, 1975) have suggested that many patients need some experience of having a therapeutic {impact on their analyst. In the Kleinian tradition, in contrast, itis felt to be erucial thata strict hierarchy be maintained between the roles of the two participants. Mutuality in any form is equated with a seduc- tion of the analyst away from their analytic function as a primary feed- ingjoedipal object. How does the patient experience the analyst's insistence on this hierarchy? It is difficult to imagine that some patients do not experience it, correctly or incorrectly, as a power oper ation, an enforced superiority that makes taking and using interpreta- tions from the analyst a form of submission, generating envious treated as manifest content, and the analyst's narrative-based wnderstandings are ranted the traditional privaleges of nomegotiaility and abjective truth to which the analyst entitled to “stand finn.”Interaction in the Kleinian Tradition «141 spoiling. [Umight be that certain portion of the destructive envy that is 50 prominent a feature of Kleinian case descriptions isan iatrogenic consequence of a tigid hierarchy in the lefinition of analytic roles, Presuming that the analyst knows what her presence and actions: mean to the patient has important political and clinical, as well as epistemological, cimeusions. This issue is sometimes addressed as if it concerned merely the question of power and authority within the analytic relationship. Challenges to the more traditional analytic pre sumption of knowledge like Gill's, are represented asa flight from the analyst's rational authority and the superimposition of a false egalitar~ ianism on the analytic relationship (e.g, Schafer, 1985). Surely, the dimension of power in these issues is not unimportant (see Benjamin, 1997), ut that is wot ou primary concer ‘ogy and authority are taken up in Chapter 7.) What is important to stress here is that the presumption that the here. (Issues of epistemol- analyst knows what her actions mean to the patient represents the de ive fork in the road dividing two broad, and very different, approaches to shaping interaction in the analytic relationship. In cer tain respects, contemporary Kleinian thinking has moved increasingly froma one-person to a two-person perspective in its understanding of ral and the interaction between the two participants in the analytic situation, Along with most other contemporary analytic schools, contemporary Kleinians believe thatthe patient’s experience in the transference is not so much a noninteractive, wholesale dis- placement of the past onto the present (as in earlier Freudian theory) as it is a response to the patient's experience of interactions with the analyst in the here-and- now. But important, interesting differences remain regarding what that experience is andl who knows about it In the recent analytic literature, some of the harshest rhetoric has surfaced in the elash between the Kleinian and the self psychological sensibilities. The issue of the adjucication of meaning is at the heart of those clashes. Phe Kleinian analyst sees through the patie scious experience andl concerns as surface, manifest material eoneeal- ing unconscious meaning underneath, This “policy of suspicion” coud not be further from what Kohut had in mind by the “empathic stance” he recommended for analysts. The patient requires, Kohut (1984) believed, a conscious experience of being accepted, validated,HQ = CHAPTER 4 and understood, certainly not seen through. Meaning, for Kohut, the developmentally most significant meaning, lies in the way the analyst manages the surface. Both these approaches have made important contributions to our understanding of the analytic process and the complex interactions between analysand and analyst. The chapters that follow develop an approach to the analytic relationship and ana- Iytic interaction based on the principle that surface and depth, con- scious and unconscious, meanings that are apparent and meanings that are elaborated, are dialectical enriching. What the analyst offers the patient is not suspicion about the patient's motives and the expo ing known only to the analyst, but a variety of complementary (and sometimes paradoxical) meanings that open up new experiential options, sure of a truer m7 _— - = «+ - — = =. OO : a =) a = : =5